Tag - Food Network

Mentos Geyser Tube Featured on Food Detectives

Ted Allen, host of Food Detectives on the Food Network, featured a segment using our Mentos Geyser Tube toy as a trigger device for their exploding soda segment. The producers did a nice job of explaining the science behind the eruption and even shared a cool variation of slowly lowering several Mentos into the bottle using a piece of wire. The demo showed why the Mentos have to quickly sink to the bottom of the bottle if you want to get a huge eruption. In their explanation, the microbiologist expert said that diet soda is used because the aspartame weakened the surface tension of the liquid which aided in the eruption. However, we know from experimentation that regular soda works well, too. Does regular sugar also weaken the surface tension? Dropping Mentos into plain seltzer water produces almost no eruption. Does this suggest that the surface tension of the liquid is higher in the plain seltzer water than it is in regular soda or diet soda?

You see… that’s why the Mentos soda geyser keeps showing up time and time
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Spangler Unwrapped: Mintastic Episode Airs in September

Tune into Food Network’s Unwrapped to get a peek inside the Spangler Science labs as Steve shares the science behind the Mentos Geyser all of that exploding soda. Back in December, I mentioned that a crew from Unwrapped on the Food Network wanted to get the real scoop on the popular Mentos and soda reaction. The crew spent an entire day grabbing the reaction from every angle and trying to understand how all of those tiny bubbles produce such a huge fountain of soda. The episode is scheduled to air on September 24, 2007. Consult your local listing for time and channel.

Steve Spangler Unwrapped? Food Network Pays a Visit

Just the thought is scary… but I’m talking about the popular show Unwrapped on the Food Network. Producers from the show called to see if they could get a better look at the science behind the Mentos Geyser Experiment and to see if they could get a sneak peek at our new line of Geyser Tube toys. Not only did they get an up close view of the spewing soda geyser, the crew learned how to cook with 20 liters of liquid nitrogen.

I forgot to mention to the photographer, Andy McDonald, that he and his expensive HD camera would disappear in a giant cloud of smoke when I poured out the liquid nitrogen. The good news is that no one died when we wrapped up the day with a round of exploding, self-carving pumpkins.